Is There Room In Bethlehem? Asks Shelter Group

Since the future is uncertain, the executive director of Center City Ministries shelter for the homeless said she is concentrating her efforts on the present.

The ministries group will open a temporary shelter today in Trinity United Church of Christ, Center and North streets, Bethlehem.

That shelter, however, will be open only until Dec. 21, when a new site must be found.

The group had hoped to have a permanent site for a shelter by now, but it abandoned plans to purchase a property at 736 Linden St. because of opposition from people in the neighborhood.

"We had threats, and not what you'd call manageable threats," said the Rev. Jo Clare Hartsig, executive director of the group. She said the ministries board felt that even if approval from the Bethlehem Planning Commission had been granted, therewould have "continued to be a problem" with the neighbors.

She explained she didn't feel she had the energy to "pacify the neighborhood" while also trying to deal with the day-to-day concerns of the shelter.

And, speaking from the perspective of the homeless, she said, "Imagine not being welcomed in the course of the day, and trying to stay out of people's way. Then you hear of a shelter and go there, and find you are not welcome in that neighborhood, either."

She said it is also difficult for volunteers who are just getting used to the facilities of one church to have to move to another.

From Feb. 1 to May 20, three-member churches each provided space and volunteers for an experimental shelter program. So far, the group has no plans to go that route again, and is still hoping to find a permanent location.

"The question is, is there room in Bethlehem?" said David Shelly of the ministries housing task force. "We really have to find something by the 21st."

He said the group will be able to determine how much need there is for a shelter when it gets started this week. "Perhaps the community as a whole needs to respond if we find there is a real need."

Rev. Hartsig said the group is looking for a neighborhood "willing to walk with us for a while," and work out problems as they come along. The potential neighbors of the proposed shelter on Linden Street had some "irrational concerns" and asked "what if?" questions that were impossible to answer, she said.

Nevertheless, the recent controversy has succeeded in raising people's awareness of the problem. "Despite a sense of a lot of resistance, there was also strong support." Unfortunately, she said, some people who were willing to give the shelter a chance were "harassed" by those who were opposed. She declined to elaborate.

In the pilot program earlier this year, a total of 143 people used the shelter. Hartsig said the number might be greater this year, because of a recent announcement that Lehigh and Northampton counties are no longer eligible for funding from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Some people who came to the shelter earlier this year were helped through these funds with rent or a down payment on a room, and did not stay at the shelter.

The new Episcopal Diocese family shelter on Wyandotte Street will take some of the burden off Center City Ministries shelter, she said.

Shelly said a soup kitchen at Trinity Episcopal Church is feeding between 80 and 100 people a day. These people, he said, are living a marginal existence, and while they might have a room or apartment this week or next week, "all of a sudden they might need a place to stay one night."

For this reason, the ministries group feels there is a need for a temporary, overnight housing facility in Bethlehem for people who for some reason or other have no place to stay, he said.

Shelly described an incident last week where a young couple came to one of the member churches and said they had lost their room. The woman was seven months pregnant. "We had no place to send them," Shelly said.

Rev. Hartsig said several churches have reported that people have been coming in asking about a place to stay. Beginning today, that space will be provided.

The congregations of Trinity United Church of Christ and other member churches have been collecting items for the shelter for the past month.

Rev. Hartsig said one of her main concerns has been to increase community awareness of the problem of the homeless by speaking to various groups in the Bethlehem. She said she was shocked at a meeting with the Planning Commission to hear a commissioner say he was not aware that such a problem existed in Beth- lehem.

"That shows how invisible the homeless are," she said. To help spread the word, she hopes city councilmen or other government officials will take a first-hand look at the shelter by volunteering their time for a night. "The way the word gets across is really through the volunteers, who then bring up their experiences in other groups," she said.